Videos: Pelosi heckled at progressive conference

posted at 12:55 pm on June 8, 2010 by Ed Morrissey

I wish I could cheer this on more, but it’s hard to tell the lefties apart in this confrontation at the America’s Future Now conference. The liberal confab welcomed the most powerful progressive in the nation — yes, that’s Nancy Pelosi, not Barack Obama — to speak on the future of the agenda that has voters about ready to press the reset button in November. A group of protesters tried to shout Pelosi down, apparently for not committing political suicide fast enough for them. The Washington Post calls it a “bizarre scene” (via The Corner and The Right Scoop):

The protesters, wearing orange shirts and chanting “Our homes, not nursing homes,” did not let up until Pelosi finished her address and left the stage with security guards. The protesters said they were members of ADAPT, an activist group that advocates for disability rights and is fighting for passage of the Community Choice Act.

They weren’t the only protesters. Code Pink also demonstrated in protest of the continuing war in Afghanistan and our support for Israel. Given that only 19% of the American public backed the side of the pro-Palestinian flotilla organizers, Code Pink must really want to see a housecleaning in November.

The AFN conference had already generated media analysis as a collection of shell-shocked liberals wondering what happened to Hope and Change. Now they have their own activists disrupting the conferences. It looks like a meltdown on the Left, and a harbinger of a deeply conflicted Democratic constituency on the eve of the midterm season.

The left has a message for Barack Obama: Shape up, or we’re shipping out.

A high-profile conclave of progressives, which served as a platform for supporting Obama in years past, opened in Washington on Monday amid growing disenchantment with the president over the Gulf oil spill, health care, jobs, immigration and political deal cutting.

Liberal activists warned that Obama can no longer count on a progressive base that was supposed to protect Democrats from a mass wipeout in the midterms in 2010 and propel him to reelection in 2012.

“We are not apathetic, we are not depressed — we are willing to get out and fight for the people who fight for us,” said Ilyse Hogue, MoveOn.org’s campaign director, at the Campaign for America’s Future annual meeting. “But no longer can they count on us for a solid Democratic vote. We are getting more sophisticated to understand that not all Democrats are created equal.”

Ah, a purity campaign! When will we start seeing media handwringing over “epistemic closure” on the Left? Prediction: never.